User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
"The brain does curious things when suddenly presented with something it cannot comprehend."Finally, a new release that I've been highly anticipating that lived up to the hype! While I wasn't expecting so much of the plot to be filled with contemporary YA day-to-day drama, I still enjoyed the creepy vibe this story gave out. If you're a fan of the
Scream franchise, this book is a must read. Dare I say it left the door open for a sequel? Maybe that's just wishful thinking on my part, but I wouldn't be mad about getting a few more answers to the happenings in Rachel's life and seeing how things play out after that final sentence. π
The book opens with a night like any other, or so we imagine. Rachel Chavez is at home, texting her best friend, when suddenly two masked men break in and attack her. In the struggle, one of the men runs and is never caught, but the other stays and tragedy ensues. Fast forward one year and we see Rachel at a new school, trying to move past the home invasion and make new friends, but it's hard when the majority of the student population comes from elite families and you're only there on scholarship because your mom is a teacher. Initially, Rachel makes some enemies, and then unknowingly sees something happen at a party that leads her on a path toward a secret society called the Mary Shelley Club.
Once initiated, Rachel finds solace and friendship with her new friends Freddie, Thayer, Bram, and Felicity. Dubbed the new girl, she is pleasantly surprised when she finds out that they know the details of what happened last year, and agree to keep her secret within the group. Outside of "meetings", the group conducts fear tests, which I'll let you discover more about on your own. As these tests progress, things escalate until an explosive ending reveals all. I'll say that I did have a bit of the who/why figured out early, but it was still such a fun ride seeing how everything would play out. I think the author did a fabulous job creating a growing sense of dread and escalating antics that really fleshed out the characters, and the complexity of the Mary Shelley Club and how far reaching it grew was really cool.
So... how about that sequel, eh?
Rating: really liked it
4.5 Stars
So, even though the ya twats got on my nerves, I liked it and hope to get the hardcover.
If anyone knows of any awesome adult books written like this, please comment below π
Mel π€πΆπΊπΎ
Rating: really liked it
Well, I am severely disappointed.
I can say two positive things about The Mary Shelley Club:
1) Between the text size and the pacing, I couldn't put it down.
2) Goldy Moldavsky knows her stuff when it comes to horror. It's glaringly obvious when a character has an interest or love for something the author couldn't care less about, but you can tell that she has a love for horror films herself. Every name-drop felt intentional or was explicitly relevant to the plot as opposed to it coming off as the author going "see? see?? I know about those scary movies too!!"
And yeah, that's about all I liked. I found Rachel to be a very bland protagonist, and honestly a bit of a Not Like Other Girls girl. See, you guys? She's not like those dumb blondes, she has freckles and likes horror movies! The other characters were all either unlikable (and not in a fun way) or boring. Felicity was...mean, I guess? Not really anything else going on there. Thayer was the comic relief, Freddie was mysterious but ultimately so bland that (view spoiler)
[ the twist that he was actually evil all along wasn't even shocking because I just didn't care about him at all. My reaction wasn't "oh my God, how could Freddie have strung her along this whole time?!", it was "oh, he was faking it? guess that explains why he's been so bland for the last 450 pages." (hide spoiler)]And speaking of twists, I called it, and also not in a fun way.
The writing was clunky and bland, and while the fear tests were an interesting concept, their executions came off as more funny than scary. Like dressing up as a clown to make your arch-enemy piss himself? Not scary, sorry.
I'm sure some people will get a kick out of this, but YA horror is becoming more and more evidently not my genre.
Rating: really liked it
The Mary Shelley Club is an excellent YA thriller about a group of horror movie-obsessed students, with dashes of
Gossip Girl thrown in for good measure.
“There’s nothing more visceral than being scared. It’s why some people love watching scary movies. I love being scared.”
Rachel is a scholarship student at tony Manchester Prep. It’s a fresh start after a tragedy forced her and her mother to leave their old home. But rather than dwell on traumatic memories, Rachel has taken to watching horror movies for comfort.
When her proximity to a prank involving a popular student gains her the kind of notoriety she doesn’t want, she also catches the attention of the Mary Shelley Club, a small group of students obsessed with horror movies. She’s thrilled to finally be a part of something, after feeling like she was on the outside looking in for so long.
The club conducts Fear Tests, elaborate pranks designed to significantly scare someone. Each club member gets to design a Fear Test, and all club members must participate in everyone's tests. But it’s not long before the tests seem to veer out of control and become dangerous, with components that seem to awaken the horrors Rachel has tried so hard to hide. Is someone in the club targeting her? Is someone else?
Man oh man,
The Mary Shelley Club was so good. It’s rare that a nearly 500-page book is so addicting but I didn’t want to put it down. I loved the conversations about movies and how they foster a shared sense of belonging, and I loved how all of the horror movie tropes were played out—and I’m not even a horror movie fan because I’m a total chickens—t.
I hope there will be a sequel to this one. I loved discussing this during my buddy read with my friend Phil. We finally found a book we loved!!
Check out my list of the best books I read in 2020 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2020.html.
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/the.bookishworld.of.yrralh/.
Rating: really liked it
Star Rating:
—> 5 StarsHonestly, there is absolutely no way I could give this any less than a 5 star rating. I started it today & just could NOT put. It. Down. It was all sorts of messed up, but I loved it! It
actually scared me... which is HARD for a book to do! It had a few small issues for me, but nothing significant enough to pull down my rating!
But this YA contemporary thriller/horror novel was also SO FUN & witty and to my glee, filled with horror film "easter eggs" & facts. It was amazing! I really don't want to spoil the ending, so, i'll just say it was both gratifying & also extremely chilling π.
I loved the lead character, Rachel, SOMUCH. She is so strong in the face of horrifying things, even after being through SO much. Her POV was so much fun to read! I also loved that the game's targets' POV's were used for each game; that was a really cool touch, and each one was more chilling than the last!
Guys. I wouldn't even put this book down for FOOD. FOOD! That's saying something! Skipped dinner, haha, which is really something I do NOT do. Buuuuut, I dis for this! I was GLUEDDDD.
This book was honestly such an addictive, fun, absolute thrill to read, and I recommend 100% !!!
[FOOTNOTE: Also, personal story related to me reading this—I live in FL in an area that is surrounded by a nature preserve, so we get tons of palmetto bugs in our house, its just a joy of living in south FL (-___-), anyway, one of those little jerks apparently got into my bedroom & was on my ceiling (exposed ceiling that is 16 ft high)... and I had absolutely no idea until it FELL ON MY FREAKING
SHOULDER DURING THE MOST INTENSE SCENE IN THE ENTIRE BOOK... and I SHRIEKED & honestly I think I blacked out for a bit there because the next thing I know my pillowcase is on the floor & I'm spraying the inch long bastard in a metric shit-ton of bug spray, my adrenaline so insane I can't even... yeah. This book had my heart racing to begin with (like I said it ACTUALLY SCARED THE HELL OUT OF ME) & the universe played a cruel, CRUEL prank on me; I literally have never had something like that happen to me in my entire life, and I just cannot believe the TIMING! The book had me prepped for self defense with adrenaline, i'll tell you what!
Or... was this incident, or 'game' planned & executed by the Mary Shelley Club, right off the pages of the book? *waggles eyebrows* I suppose i'll never know ;) The game isn't over until the target has screamed.
And boy did I f*cking scream. π Also, props to me being the Final Girl. Just giving credit where credit is due π€·πΌβοΈππ
I suppose between me & a palmetto bug, there was never a chance of another outcome but shhhh... I went through TRAUMA guys. Just let me have this one :-P]
Rating: really liked it
Ok..... seriously I have been dreaming about a YA thriller like this!!
Goldy... you're my new favorite author and I absolutely LOVED this YA thriller.
BUCKLE up ladies and gentleman. OH my guacamole you're in for a serious wild ride with this one. I am SOO lucky to have gotten an early copy of this masterpiece.
Let's meet Rachel... she has been attacked early on by two masked men when she is home alone. She is terrifed and is trying to recover from this horrible event. She transfers to a new school and is trying to build a new life in high school. Rachel soon learns about a mysterious "Mary Shelley Club" and is very intrigued since she loves horror movies.
Luckily, Rachel finds herself as a new member of this Mary Shelley Club and finds out that the number one goal is to scare people. Simple right?
Each member has what's called a "fear test." They each have to identify a target and the rest of the group plays along with the scene that is played out for that target.
This is all about you're going to get from me. This was pure GENIUS. I loved this book. Goldy does an amazing job in this unique and addicting YA thriller. It reads more of an adult thriller but does have aspects of a YA thriller.
Oh my... and Goldy you pulled it off. You got me at the end there with that twist. Will we be lucky enough to get a sequel!? Squeals with anticipation.
4.5/5 stars
Thank you so much to Macmillian/Henry Holt and netgalley for the arc in exchange for an honest review.
Pub date: 4/13/21
Published to GR: 2/16/21
Rating: really liked it
Loved it! Sooooo good...
First things first, I'm not a kind of person who would be overly enthusiastic about a blurb mentioning One of Us is Lying. Scream? now we are talking. Mary Shelley? oh, yes, please. I love Frankenstein (with its monumental influence on our popculture) and I love the story behind its creation. In this case, the publicist's description was spot on and I enjoyed every minute of this wild ride.
Rachel Chavez is the proverbial new girl in a new school. Something bad happened to her last year which made her mum and Rachel move and change their job and school respectively. The only thing Rachel's mum insists on is Rachel keeping up her grades (you begin to wonder what exactly happened to have sent her into a spin last year, right?) and make friends. Which she kind of does. She even gets dragged (not literally, we haven't started on the horror part, but we'll get there, don't get too comfortable) to a teenage party in an abandoned house. A prank is played and the scene is set. Rachel makes an enemy of a popular girl who won't stop spreading her unsolicited opinion of Rachel ('Freak!).
When Rachel finally confronts the prankster, she discovers the existence of the most mysterious and be default exclusive The Mary Shelley Club. Perhaps,she has finally found 'her own tribe', people who appreciate horror movie tropes in all their marvelous variety and see the genre the way Rachel does- as a cleansing mechanism to flush out all the wrong things in one's life, an injection of adrenaline and courage. Perhaps, this is her way to face what happened to her, the changes in herself and her biggest fear. Perhaps, she can belong. But first, she needs to pass the Fear Test, and this is where what seems an innocent game is going to get deadly serious. As it would in any decent horror movie....
The writing style is effortless and easy to follow. You get so immersed in what Rachel experiences that it is as if you've stepped into her life. Or at the very least, a brilliant horror movie. you are a bit edgy and suspicious,but you can't turn your eyes off the screen. Ups! I meant to say off the page...
Rachel is a likeable and relatable protagonist. Don't we all want to fit in and belong, without sacrificing what makes us unique? How far would we go in this desire? How far would we push other people to get what we want and what would it do to us? Goldy Moldavsky masterfully renders this universal teenage angst in this exciting YA thriller.
Well-written, gripping, perceptive, The Mary Shelley is wickedly entertaining. I'm glad to have found a new author to watch out for- Goldy Moldavsky.
Thank you to Giselle from Xpresso Book tours, NetGalley and Henry Holt and Co. (BYR) for the review copy provided in exchange for an honest opinion.
Rating: really liked it
2.5 StarsI loved the idea of a character using horror films to cope with their own trauma. As an avid horror reader, I can certainly relate to finding comfort in the genre. My biggest complaints about this book come from my usual issues with YA novel. I found the characters to be young and immature, going to parties and worrying about trivial relationship issues. If you enjoy meta horror books and don't mind reading in the YA age category, then you might enjoy this one.
Rating: really liked it
DNF at 30%. I just really really don’t like it. I so want to. The title and the cover is absolutely stunning. But I can’t get through it.
Rating: really liked it
A self-aware horror movie trope-fest with intriguing drama and action to keep any mystery/thriller fan satisfied throughout the entire journey... Nice.
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So let's be honest:
this is not the most unique concept in the world. It wasn't supposed to be. The new girl at school becomes embroiled in something bigger than herself and finds herself consumed by a secretive group of students who do devious things at their prep school for the thrills and chills. They're horror movie experts with a need for thrills—and they call themselves the Mary Shelley Club. It's your standard setup for this kind of mystery/thriller, yes, but sometimes you choose the classics for a reason...
Rachel Chavez is no stranger to horror.
A victim of a home invasion turned horrific, Rachel has turned to horror movies as means to cope with her trauma and inoculate herself against future fear. Is it healthy? Probably not. But is is working? Jury's out.
When Rachel attends a late-night party for her high school and witnesses a sinister prank and instead of getting scared, she laughs instead,
Rachel brings herself to the attention of the Mary Shelley Club. They invite her in, and that's when things get interesting.
Because while the Mary Shelley Club members are supposed to be the horror that stalks their student body,
Rachel can't help but notice that something seems to be stalking her too. And things might not be what they seem.
I thought this was an extremely well done book for its tropes.
With the classic setup, character sheets, and mysteries included, The Mary Shelley Club was almost a nostalgic ride through the hits of young adult mysteries mixed with a dash of horror movie classics. I thoroughly enjoyed it. For someone who's read a fair few in this genre, the surprises were not earth-shattering, but I did find myself falling for a few of red herrings along the way and did get authentically surprised at one of the final elements.
A nicely done, nicely paced, and all-around enjoyable young adult thriller. Definitely pick this up if you're a fan of the genre.
Blog | Instagram
Rating: really liked it
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This one's a bit of a rollercoaster. It starts out pretty solidly, has a strong middle, and then kind of descends into shaky melodrama at the end.But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's skip back to the beginning.
Rachel Chavez and her mum have just moved to a new house in New York. Their reason for fleeing the old house? Rachel killed a home intruder, who later turned out to be a boy from her school. Now she's ready for a new start.
But one night at a party, she notices something weird. There's a manufactured 'horror prank' which targets Manchester Prep's queen bee, and a boy called Freddie seems to be behind it. When she confronts him, he denies it, but she eventually squeezes the truth out of him: he - along with a girl called Felicity, a boy called Thayer, and the queen bee's boyfriend Bram - are part of the Mary Shelley Club, a secret society dedicating to creating scares for their fellow classmates. It's structured as a game, and whoever can make their target scream in the best way wins.
Rachel is hooked immediately. But even as she gets closer and closer to Freddie, the rest of the Club seem frustratingly out of reach, especially Bram. And something's not quite right with the game. How far, exactly, are they allowed to go?
Okay, so this has a cool premise, and for the most part the execution is decent too. Rachel is a likeable heroine, desperate to fit in but also knowing she can't. Her fascination with old horror movies is a nice touch that ties the whole book together. I've never watched any myself though so I can't really comment.
The ending... I wasn't a fan of. It's very abrupt, there are a LOT of loose ends, and is edgy enough that one might call it a mild cliff-hanger. The thing is, I actually predicted the plot twist, then dismissed it because I saw there was only 5% of the book left and that wasn't enough to handle it well. I was right, it wasn't enough.
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Overall
A sharp, mostly tight novel which isn't precisely scary but carries a good chill factor to it.
[Blog] 
Rating: really liked it
Actual rating 3.5/5 stars.
The synopsis stated this book was
"Scream meets Gossip Girl with a dash of One of Us is Lying" and I'd say that was a pretty apt comparison.
Rachel Chavez has overcome a tragic ordeal and her go-to coping mechanism is horror films, the gorier and the ghostlier the better. Few in her new school understand her obscure references and those who do seem to want nothing to do with her. Rachel is determined to infiltrate their ranks, but when she manages to do so she discovers there is far more than just a penchant for watching horror that binds them together. These differing individuals also like to create it, as well.
The crafting of different horror scenarios was such an awesome and unique addition to this story, but the more drama and angst filled sections in-between failed to appeal for me, in quite the same way. The contemporary genre was represented just as much as the thriller genre was and as I am someone who reads little from the former category, I found myself wading through some sections and longing to return to the thrills and chills I had come here anticipating. This was still a thoroughly engaging story, with many concluding twists I did not see coming, but wasn't wholly my vibe, throughout.
Also, the US title, The Mary Shelley Club, along with its creepy cover is far superior to the UK title, The Last Girl, with its bland gold one. Just sayin'.
I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to the author, Goldy Moldavsky, and the publisher, Electric Monkey, for this opportunity.
Rating: really liked it
I thought this was just okay. I liked the premise, but was hoping for it to be a little creepier. I also felt like it was pretty predictable. It does seem like it set up the option for a book two, though I’m torn on whether or not I’d read a sequel or not!
Rating: really liked it
That was glorious!
Rating: really liked it
Do you understand what addiction is? Just like any other feeling, this too is pure, raw and exponential when fed with the right fodder.
This book was my addiction and the Mary Shelley club its fodder. I was compelled to spend nights, awake, looking like a zombie in the dark, devouring this book like one devours a late night snack. Was the horror fanatic in me overindulged? Definitely. I just can't give horror the sole bragging rights though. For someone who has the attention span of a fly, I did pretty well with this one. So yeah, the narration was impeccable too.
Was this book silly? Yes, hands down. Did I like silly? I was starving for it. I crammed it down my throat like it would all evaporate from the face of the Earth if I didn't.
I loved the characters, I loved the thrills, and yes, I also loved how predictable it felt it was, while it actually wasn't!
Pranks. Oh no, the Mary Shelley club prefers to call that the Art of Fear. To see how fear manifests, how it triggers the flight or fight response, and how it is possible to gain power over it. This exclusive club goes beyond anything and everything to achieve their goals. Sprinkled with the right amount of humour and suspense, the story twists and turns to an ending that is both unnerving and surreal. From Elite and The Babysitter to Get Even and Pretty Little Liars, this book has all the classic horror feels with just the bling to validate all the glamour.
